You are to develop the capacity to love yourself so completely that you can be the hero of your life.
I am Olivia S. Benson, and for those of you who’ve been here before, I’m the author of these two books. One is Answers from Within, and the other one is For the Love of My Father.
For the Love of My Father is basically a spiritual guide for healing from the absence of a father. And the other one, Answers from Within, is a spiritual guide for finding answers to work-life issues. But today, today, we are going to talk about For the Love of My Father, because I came across a video.
Oh, by the way, there was a winner of the contest to win a free signed copy of Answers from Within, and the winner is @JamieSWrites96. So we’ll be getting your book out to you very, very shortly. First, get in touch with you and let you know if you haven’t seen it yet, and then go ahead and mail it to you. Thank you for entering the contest. Thank you for everyone that participated. Thank you for sharing and liking and all the things that you had to do. We really, really appreciate it, and it’s really, really helpful.
Today, we’re going to talk about some of the things that I speak about in Answers from Within. And I have five nuggets for any woman, any girl who grew up without a father. Five things that I personally have learned that have helped me to heal and to grow as a girl who grew up without her father.
And as I was thinking about this subject and what I was going to talk about, I was fortunate, because I came across a video. And it was a video of Venus’s father — Venus as in Venus and Serena — and her father basically defending her before a reporter. At that time, she was 14 years old. And the video is going to be played here so you can see it.
But before we go there, and that you see the video, I just want to say that when you watch it, you are going to know that feeling. If you are what I call a fatherless girl, you’re going to know that feeling of the difference it would make if your father had been present to stand for you in similar ways as Venus and Serena’s father did. What he did is just amazing. So let’s cut away to the video, and you can watch it, and then we’ll come back and we’ll discuss.
I know I can beat it. You know, very confident. I’m very confident. You say it so easily. Why?
Mr. Williams: Because I believe what she has said. She said it with so much confidence the first time, but you keep going on and on. So we can’t keep interrupting. If you want, you got to understand that you’re dealing with an image of a 14-year-old child, and this child will be out there playing with your old ass and me going to be in the grave. When she says something, we done told you what’s happening. You’re dealing with a little black kid, and let her be a kid. She done answered it with a lot of confidence. Leave that alone.
Realize the impact that it actually has
Okay, so I’m watching the video again. I’ve watched it like a million times, but basically what happens is that a reporter is asking little Venus — she’s 14 years old — and he’s asking her about whether essentially she believes that she can beat a particular competitor. And she says in the video that she can, and she says it very confidently. And if you go back and look at it again, you’ll see that the reporter, he basically then asked her again why. And I want to put the racial undertones of this video aside for the moment, because basically what we’re saying here is, it doesn’t matter what the racial dynamics are.
The bottom line is that her father jumped up, as you’ve seen, and jumped in and said, listen, this is a kid, and you’re not going to undermine her confidence by asking her about why she’s confident. And boy, would I have loved to have had a father. The video is playing here next to me, but I’ve seen it a hundred times, and if you saw the clip before, you see where Mr. Williams basically gets up and goes to the reporter and says, this is a child, and you’re not going to keep asking her the same thing. She already answered the question. She’s confident, so what else is there to ask? There’s nothing else to be discussed.
So if you’re a fatherless girl, and you observe this, there’s some things that you can see. And the first thing that I would say to you, if you’re on this healing journey to address this issue of growing up without a father, or any hurt that might be caused because of your relationship with your father: the first thing you need to do is to realize the impact that it actually has. Because, and I’ve said this before, I grew up and I was just living and doing the best that I could.
I never even thought until I was way in my 30s that the absence of my father had had such a profound impact on who I was and how I behaved, maybe how I interacted with men. I never thought that until I was in my 30s, and I was like, well, I think something’s a little bit out of sorts here, and began to look at the whole story. So that’s the first thing.
She knows that her dad has her back
You realize that it’s an issue, because if you look at the Venus and her dad video, you notice that when the father gets up and goes to the reporter and confronts him, Venus is just sort of laying back in it. She’s 14, of course. She’s sort of laying back in the chair. She’s playing around with something she might’ve had in her hand. She’s just fiddling around, but she’s very comfortable. And you know why she’s very comfortable? Because she knows that her dad has her back.
And if you’re a fatherless girl, or someone who grew up with a strained relationship with their father, what you know is that he does not have your back. What you know is, as I often say, that nobody is coming. There’s not going to be a guy on the horse. Your dad is not coming down from the mountain to save you.
So your foundation — what we see in this video is that Venus’s foundation is strong. She knows. She can sit in that chair. She doesn’t look scared. She says, I’m confident. She says, I can beat this person. And the guy asks her and she says, I just do. And then her father jumps in and said, hey, leave her alone. She said she could. This is a little kid. Why are you questioning that? Why are you trying to undermine her, is essentially what he’s saying.
And that is so valuable. Because as a young woman, if you’re growing up without your father, what happens is that you have situations like this. They’re not going to be this big, because most of us are not celebrities and not being interviewed on national TV and all this kind of stuff. But you have similar situations where, let’s say a teacher speaks to you in a certain way, or a neighbor or a friend, somebody. And the idea that you would know that your father is going to come to defend you is a big deal. And if you don’t have that, it makes your internal foundation a little bit wobbly.
You have to make a decision that you’re going to address it
The second thing that is important for you to consider in this process is that if you realize that this is an issue, you have to make a decision that you’re going to address it. This is something so deep and so foundational to who you are that it’s not just going to disappear. This is what the structures of your life are built on as a child, emotionally.
And I know they have a specific definition for structures of life in psychology and things like that. I’m not using it in that way. I’m just saying that emotionally you come up where you don’t have the feeling — that’s what I’m talking about, the feeling that somebody is right behind you. Just like if I was sitting here as a kid and I had someone behind me, in the sense that I would know that if something happened, that person would step in. And when you grow up without that, it can make you emotionally shaky. So the next decision and the next thing to consider is what you’re willing to do. It’s not going to just magically disappear.
Unconscious behavior says man just like daddy
The third thing that I would say, based on my experience, is when you get into a relationship, an intimate relationship as a woman, you have to remember that unconsciously, in many cases, you’re bringing everything that you believe about your dad. And unconscious behaviors don’t go, man, not daddy. Unconscious behavior says, man just like daddy. Unconscious.
Maybe you’re not thinking it consciously, but the programming underneath — which, by the way, in this book I talk about under your cargo, your ship, and the things that are planted under there, and going in and cleaning that cargo out — that incorrect programming, that incorrect information, it has to be removed. Because otherwise you’re going to go out there and everything that you believe, everything that you’re carrying around about your beliefs, about your dad, good or bad by the way, it’s going to bring that exact person to you. Somebody just like your dad. You’re actually a beacon, because the energies that you’re carrying, the belief systems that you’re carrying, will attract that.
And I had a friend of mine once — sometimes I’ve seen people even if they had serious daddy issues find someone who was a good mate. And this particular person said to me, listen, I don’t know what to do. My wife needs some therapy, because she’s never addressed her daddy issues. And they were together, and I think they’re still together, but he recognized that she had never seen her father after a certain point in her life, and that that was still underneath. She had made it right in many ways, and she had a significant other in her life, but he knew that that was an underlying issue.
So: knowing it’s an issue, deciding to work on it, and understanding the impact that it’s going to have, without any question, on the relationship that you have. It impacts the relationship, particularly intimate relationships, and also in general your relationship with men. Because you have to know what your belief system is about men. Your father is the first person, as a male, who is going to frame what your beliefs are about men. And you have to be clear about that.
He never showed up on time
And if you have crazy programming written in there — you know, your subconscious mind just writes in, okay, men are this, men are that, he disappoints me, he this, he that, he’s a liar, whatever. That program is not discriminating against, oh, this is a good guy.
And I’ll give you an example. I might have mentioned it before. My father often, often would say, I’m going to do this, or I’m going to do that, and I’ll be there at whatever time. Let’s say he said 6 p.m. And he never — in fact, in here there’s stories about how he never showed up. He never, not even one time, did what he said he was going to do. He never showed up, he never showed up on time. There was always this anxiety around, is he coming, and when is he coming. And to my recollection — maybe there was one time he did, but to my recollection, really, he just didn’t. And if he ever did anything, it was always late.
So I’m a young woman and I start dating, and a guy is late. Poor guy, he’s just late, nothing to do with my dad. What does that mean to me? He’s late, he’s disappointing me, he is everything — everything that has nothing to do with this poor human being is coming back like an arrow. And I’m thinking that this is who he is. And this is not happening consciously, right? The first thing that happens is, he’s late. I’m just mad, I’m just mad beyond all reason.
That’s what the person would say, right? But that poor soul didn’t know what had happened to me before. And that happens to women often. And I see guys are like, what happened? I mean, it’s just xyz, xyz. Well, she doesn’t even know that her response is not just a response to that particular thing. It’s a response to everything that her father did to her. So you got to understand what’s going on underneath.
You can be the hero of your life
Now, when we look at Venus and her father and how delightful he is — I just love it. He sets that reporter straight. He’s this close to his face, and he basically says, leave her alone, she’s a kid. This kid is protected. And this guy is not afraid, because at one point, if you listen to the video, the reporter says to him, well, are you going to keep interrupting? And apparently the answer is yes. I’m going to interrupt as many times as I need to interrupt to protect my daughter.
Now, we could look at this and say, wow, well, lucky for her, but that’s not my circumstance. Well, here’s the truth. It may not be your circumstance. I don’t know. Go back and watch the life is a box of chocolates video that I did. Because in that video I said, we come here, we don’t know what the story is. We don’t know what we’re going to get. We don’t know what parents or whatever. But whatever the story is, our job is to work our way through it. So these people get this and these people get that. If you happen to come in this lifetime and you did not have a father who was present for you, that just means that’s what you need to work on.
So we can look at Venus and say, well, good for her. Here is the lesson. She had someone to protect her from the time she was very, very young. You may not have that. But guess what? You’re grown now. And if nobody ever showed up to protect you, guess who should be ready to protect you now? It’s you. And that’s what this healing process is all about. You are to develop the capacity to love yourself so completely, so that you can be the hero of your life.
In Venus and Serena’s case, their dad was the hero of their life. But everybody doesn’t get one of those. And you might not have gotten one. But the deal is, you can heal. You can learn your lessons. And you can become all of those things to yourself.
If you’re here, you have a chance
And as to Daddy, you know, he might have failed. He might have missed the mark in many, many ways. But that’s not going to help you. That’s his issue over there. The question is how you live today. What you do with yourself. He missed the mark, but it’s important that you don’t miss the mark, because you’re here. You have an opportunity.
And if you haven’t seen it, go back and see the Katt Williams video where he says, if you’re here, you’ve been through all kinds of things. But if you’re here, you have a chance. And that’s what I love to share with you with regards to the issue of growing up without a father. It might be sad. It might be difficult. But you have a chance to sort of redeem your life from those circumstances. You might have come into those circumstances, but you have the ability to make the change and to be a hero of your life.
And For the Love of My Father, I talk about my journey and more of the tools that I used to help to heal from this issue. Here we’re talking about: know that it’s an issue. Decide to heal. Understand the impact that it has in and on your relationships. And then understand that even if your life’s story did not include an amazing dad, that you have the opportunity to be a hero in your life.
I’m Olivia S. Benson. The name of this book is For the Love of My Father, A Spiritual Guide for Women Healing from the Absence of a Father. It’s available on Amazon. Please check out my website. It’s OliviaSBenson.com.